Chewing gum is the most difficult type of litter to deal with. Its stickiness means normal cleaning methods like street sweeping and litter picking don't work.

More extreme methods like jet washing and steam cleaning have to be used to remove it and this is expensive. Chewing gum is highly resistant to aggressive chemicals and does not degrade. Like other forms of littering the depositing of gum in public spaces can attract a fixed penalty notice of £75. As with graffiti and fly posting, if gum is left to build up on surfaces the local area soon look grimy, dirty and generally neglected.

Better Bankside has been dealing with the problem of chewing gum on pavements and the surfaces of public spaces for the lifetime of the BID. We know well the difficulties of removing gum and we deploy our resources to both help prevent littering and to remove gum from the surfaces that we clean.

At one level Better Bankside's local cleaning team will use jet washing and freezing methods to help loosen and remove gum. Often the best, though most time consuming method is physically to scrape gum from the surfaces. For more extensive cleaning we use a specialist street washing contractor to steam clean the surfaces to remove gum along with grime, stains and grease marks.

To help prevent gum being thrown on the ground, Better Bankside has fixed Gumcatchers to lampposts along the Riverside Walk by Southwark Bridge and in Stoney Street and Park Street near the Borough Market.